1. Field of the Invention
This invention pertains to navigation systems, and more particularly to the correction of Inertial Navigation Systems with the utilization of Global Position System data.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Inertial Navigation Systems (INS) on ships generally provide good position accuracy. Component drift, however, degrades the navigation accuracy over a period of time and correction becomes necessary. These corrections are facilitated with the utilization of the Global Positioning System (GPS). If, however, the inertial position is tightly slaved to the GPS, the output position contains too much GPS short-term noise.
Use of GPS data alone is not reliable because of short-term noise in position data and occasional erroneous GPS data samples due to change of constellation or other GPS problems. INS data alone, even while using a GPS for reference, does not provide sufficient position accuracy when the position accuracy desired is but a few meters. A closely coupled INS/GPS solution may introduce GPS short-term noise into the integral of velocity data, thus causing an out-of-specification error in the position output.
The mean value of GPS position data is believed to be accurate, for normal surface ship navigation conditions, with a mean value position error, 95% of the time, that is less than 5 meters. Excessive errors are observed in GPS position for single data samples and at the change of satellite constellation. Inertial position provided by a good INS is not as accurate as GPS; but is believed to be smoother over short periods of time than GPS data.
What is needed is a filtered INS/GPS position output to follow the mean GPS position smoothly and eliminate high frequency position errors that are present in the GPS position data. This filtered INS/GPS position output would combine the good long term accuracy (low frequency) content of the GPS position with the good short term (high frequency) content of the INS position.
The present invention uses data editing to eliminate obviously large errors in GPS data and a low pass filter on the difference between INS and GPS position to form a complementary filter which combines the good long term accuracy (low frequency) content of the GPS position with the good short term (high frequency) content of the INS position. To achieve the desired position accuracy, lever arm correction of the GPS input data is performed.
Enhanced position accuracy is provided by correcting INS Latitude and Longitude output to more closely match a GPS receiver output. This correction provides less variation (jumps) in position than the GPS alone. On ships that have more than one INS, GPS data sent to one INS is lever arm corrected by the GPS receiver. An INS other than the one INS is data and lever arm corrected by the one INS which is coupled to the GPS receiver. A filtered difference between the GPS and the INS positions are taken and applied as a correction to the INS position. Additionally, position reset step size is reduced by changing position resets from a step to a ramp applied over the time period between position resets.